Jilted man kills ex, friend, himself

PLANTATION | MURDER-SUICIDE

Police said the killer of two young women at a Plantation gas station is now dead and once had a relationship with one of the victims.

Related Content

• Crime scene in Plantation gas station 

BY SOFIA SANTANA AND ROBERT NOLIN

SUN SENTINEL

The victims: two women in their 20s, one a community college student with dreams of being a fashion designer, the other a recent arrival from Key West.

The killer: a jilted boyfriend with a history of domestic violence who within hours took his own life with a bullet to the head on the side of a road.

Under the harsh lights of an all-night gas station in suburban Plantation, Jillian Hauck, 27, and Brooke Pazo, 22, were gunned down early Friday by a man who had shadowed them in a black car. Both lived in Plantation. Pazo was less than a mile from her home.

Their killer, police said, was Robert J. Vaughan, 30, of Pembroke Pines, who had recently split up with Hauck. Plantation police spokesman Robert Rettig said Pazo was not specifically targeted, just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

''It appears that the motive in the Chevron shooting was domestic violence related,'' Rettig said.

According to Rettig, at 1 a.m. a dark green, two-door Acura owned by Hauck turned into the Chevron station at the northwest corner of Pine Island Road and Broward Boulevard and pulled up to pump six. Vaughan followed, parked, got out and fired several shots into the car.

One woman died at the scene. The other died later at Broward General Medical Center. Police would not identify who died where.

Two hours later, Vaughan was found dead in the 5600 block of Hawks Bluff Avenue in Davie. He had a gunshot wound to the head.

NEVER SERVED

In September 2007, Hauck filed papers in Broward County Court seeking a temporary restraining order against Vaughan, citing domestic violence. She withdrew the petition two weeks later, and Vaughan was never served with the order, court records show.

Jeff Sternshein, of Fort Lauderdale, said his 23-year-old son witnessed the shooting at the station. The son said one woman was in the driver's seat and the other was preparing to pump gas when the killer approached and fired about nine shots from close range. He got back in his car and sped away.

Sternshein said his son ran from a vehicle about 15 feet away to the injured woman in the driver's seat. ''He held her hand, and he stayed with her'' until medics arrived.

Sternshein declined to identify his son by name.

The case was Plantation's second highly public domestic killing in 14 months.

Last April, Olidia Kerr Day, 45, sought refuge at the Plantation police station after being chased by Carlos Cevallos, 48, whom she had rebuffed. Cevallos killed Day outside the station and turned the gun on himself.

AMBITIONS

Hauck was identified in an online profile as an aspiring fashion designer who attended Broward College and American Intercontinental University. She attended Plantation High School, where she played soccer. Family and friends gathered throughout the day at Hauck's apartment to grieve and comfort her parents, who declined to comment.

Public records show Pazo moved to Plantation in 2007 from Key West, where she was a cheerleader at Key West High School and a member of the Beta Club.

In 2003, Pazo was among 42 Conch students certified by the Literacy Volunteers of America to be tutors in the English as a Second Language program, helping other students who had problems reading, writing and speaking English. Brooke's mother Carrie is a fourth-grade teacher at Poinciana Elementary School. Pazo's parents, Caridad and Louis, live in Key West along with her brother and older sister.

Caridad Pazo teaches fourth grade, and Louis works at Fausto's Grocery, where police notified him of his daughter's death.

Louis Pazo collapsed upon hearing the news. ''Tell me she's not dead, Tell me she's not dead,'' store manager and former Key West Mayor Jimmy Weekley recalled the father saying. His daughter was supposed to have visited this weekend.

Anyone with information, call Crime Stoppers, 954-493-TIPS. Sun-Sentinel Staff Writer Juan Ortega and Sun-Sentinel staff Researchers Gilbert Medina and Barbara Hijek, and Key West Keynoter reporter Sean Kinney contributed to this report.